These are all actual things that have been said to Jaya, in what she presumes are attempts to compliment her appearance or hit on her. This is how she wishes she had responded.
Tags: Being Hit On, comics, curly hair, honestly they could probably all be sucker punches, jaya saxena, matt lubchansky, stolen eyeballs
Is it okay if I hit on both of you because of how superb this is?
(Not that I don’t also adore your curly hair and the actual reality of your eyeballs, lest you think I’m not objectifying you and therefore am not serious about how I’m hitting on you because of y’alls humor and talent and generally perfect souls.)
“You’re too pretty to be reading in a bar.”
Reading in a bar is one of life’s greatest secret pleasures, what does this even MEAN
Seriously, as soon as I saw that one, I thought, if anyone ever says that to me I will set them on fire.
Reading a book in a place where someone else will make you an alcoholic beverage, clean up the mess from that, and take the glass away when you’re done and bring you another. DON’T LET ME SUCCUMB TO THAT HELL.
Lousy smarch weather…
oh that last one. yes, the nonchalant backwards facepunch!
the best answer to so many problems!
The only thing better would be River Tam doing that thing where she kicks a guy in the back of the head while standing in front of him.
“Hey! You’ve lost weight!” from someone I’ve seen around for months but who’s never deigned to speak to me before is what I call leading with the chin.
In general, I don’t like weight-focused comments, even the allegedly “positive” ones, from men OR from women, but if they come up in the course of a regular conversation I’m more tolerant of the positive ones (needless to say, the negative ones never have any business being said). It’s the culture and we’re soaking in it, after all.
Leading with the chin! Delightful. Snagging for future use in cutting put-downs.
I’m planning to read MIDDLESMARCH as soon as I’m done with TESS OF THE D’SMURBERVILLES.
Don’t forget SPRIDE AND SPREJUDICE
Ha! I’ve always preferred Ssense and Ssensibility… oh goddamit.
SMENSE AND SMENSIBILITY roll with this sucker
smemma
<3
#2 reminds me of Maria Bamford’s “BABY PRETTY NOW, MOMMY?!?!” bit. Timeless.
I concur so, so hard.
I legitimately don’t understand the ‘real eyes’ thing – like, as opposed to colored contacts? Are those even still a thing?
I thought the lame humor was that the eyes are one of the few things that can’t be fake but yeah, there’s colored contacts so that makes the comment both stupid and unfunny.
Ah, that makes sense. I bet if you’re REALLY lucky, they’ll follow it up with a monologue about “natural beauty” :-/
I’ve actually been asked if my eyes are real. I didn’t think to ask what he meant, I believe my response was a look of extreme bewilderment followed by swiveling the other way on my bar stool.
Ah yes. One I was waiting for the bus and someone told me I was “too pretty to be taking the bus.”
OK.
THIS BUS IS FOR UGGOS ONLY, TAKE A CAB LADY
So pretty you should never leave the house.
So pretty that you should be locked in a tower until your beauty fades. And then you should remain locked in the tower lest a man be forced to look upon your faded beauty.
Public transportation, the province of jerks and lesbians.
Girl, you’re so attractive you oughta be riding in a hansom cab.
😀 😀 😀
Now I want to use this line to hit on someone and I think my boyfriend will be offended.
Can you use it to hit on your boyfriend?
You know, I bet I could! He knows what a hansom cab is, I think, and if he doesn’t then it naturally segues into my excitedly telling him another new word, which he NEVER* tires of.
*He’s way tired of it.
I am a big fan of hitting on one’s boyfriend.
Right? You already know he’s a good person and a good kisser.
Also men don’t get a lot of compliments on their looks, and after they get a crapton of sincere compliments from someone they’re attracted to about how cute they are, somehow, magically, they understand that insincere compliments from someone one isn’t attracted to are unpleasant.
I used to get told I was “too pretty to be on my bike” by randos in trucks at stoplights. Then i cut my hair all queer-like and now they just yell “FAG!”
Little do they know I’m a big ol’ genderqueer and take it as a compliment on my ability to pass!
The first one is Actually Me, failing to pick up on Actual Flirting.
I don’t know what pheromones I give off that make scumbags not talk to me or hit on me or notice I exist, but I appreciate them now more than ever. (And my heart goes out to all you lovelies who do get hit on and harassed.)
I almost negged myself in this comment to say that I’m not at all conventionally attractive, but stopped myself because I know that’s really not what catcalling and street harassment are about.
I am a Young and work with a couple ladies who are a bit older, and one of them once walked into a conversation I was having with another younger co-worker about street harassment, listened for a few minutes, and then busted out the old “APPRECIATE IT NOW, YOU’LL MISS IT WHEN YOU’RE MY AGE.” It was a disheartening reminder of how much the “it’s a compliment, you’re just hot!” thing is still the prevailing view on street harassment.
I didn’t appreciate it when I was younger, and I certainly don’t miss it now that I’m in my 40s, AKA The Age of Invisibility. I’d rather be ignored than harassed.
I have noticed it lessen over the years, and rejoice every time I steel myself for a cat call or comment and instead just get to move through the world like a human. No. I will not miss “turning heads” unless I also gain the power to makes those heads do a full 360.
Word to this and your previous comment. I dunno what those vibes are and I think they stop me from meeting actual nice humans out in the world but if they are protecting me from this stuff, they are 2000% worth it.
I personally sport perma-bitchface. It works pretty well in warding off…well, everyone, but “everyone” includes scumbags, so I think I win?
Except the scumbags who see it and tell you to smile, it might never happen…
Do you have a preferred response? I always want to burst into tears and say my grandma died and then tell them about her snickerdoodles and how she always wore White Diamonds perfume, but I’ve done that like, twice.
I do sometimes say I’m on my way to/from a funeral, or that a parent just died, sometimes I just say FUCK OFF, and sometimes if I’m feeling ranty and they can’t escape me I ask them what makes them feel they have the right to impose their ideas of an appropriate facial expression on a perfect stranger when they have no idea whther my mother just died.
I’m considering saying to the next person who demands I smile that I would if they danced for me. They might actually do it, though.
I’m a big fan of, “Why the fuck should I?”
Perma-bitchface + thousand-yard stare + tendency to stride quickly everywhere I go works pretty well for me, generally.
Yeah, I call mine the “fuck-off face”. It has thus far spared me from the local creep, so far so good. I think it might help that I also have a rehearsed answer just waiting to spring on him the first time he puts a verbal toe out of line.
I don’t know what it is either but I’m guessing it’s your unutterably sweet nature impressed the fairies enough to wrap you in some kind of protective enchantment.
Mine is probably mostly because I’m overweight, but I don’t get overtly hit on often. I am, however, usually oblivious when it does happen.
Also, this is one of the few advantages of being pregnant. No one hits on pregnant ladies. I think? At least they haven’t.
When I was eight months pregnant a man followed me for four blocks asking me inappropriate questions about my pregnancy, including a hopeful “are you still with the dad?”
! RAGE!!!
I was shaking with anger! Pregnancy made me feel really vulnerable though, so my usual response to that shit (unhinge my jaw and unleash a swarm of fuckwords) was unavailable to me. I just stared at him with all the hatred I could muster.
WHAT?! NO! AHHH!
I thank my bitchface/inability to keep bitchface from forming when people are being annoying every day.
It took me a few views to see that the head is poking out of the WYNC totebag in the first frame of that vignette. (is that what I should call these? It’s the only word coming to mind to describe them.) Nice work.
On the Metro Platform, waiting. Man beside me says, “You have a big butt. Some guys don’t like that, but I do.”
I wish I had punched him, but instead I said leave me alone, rather loudly.
D:
Ugh, the metro. I almost got followed home by a guy I thought I was just having a nice, polite chat with. I don’t talk to people on the metro anymore.
I emit some kind of force field which prevents me from being hit on. My current theory is that it involves tachyon particles. Flirting, yes. Hit on, almost never. So if someone does actually manage to penetrate the field, it sets off my panic response. Have not yet punched anyone, though.
Just keep this video handy as an example.
Oh my gosh, the ‘real eyes’ thing! I get that a lot and what does that even mean? Is it negging?
Other people get the “real eyes” line too!! Is it in some PUA manual? Because the likelihood of multiple people coming up with that shit on their own seems pretty small. And does it ever actually work?
I guess they think it’s clever? It works at letting me know to get the hell away from them!
I never get the real eyes thing (probably because they are brown) but I wonder what would just happened if you answered either
“No”
or went into excruciatingly gruesome detail about the revolutionary eye transplant you received when you were 17!
Gruesome eye transplant comeback: I’VE DONE IT. Kinda disappointing, though. The guy just sort of laughed nervously and changed the subject.
Hahahahaha the last time a dude tried to hit on me in a bar (it was in the middle of a long-awaited reunion with a friend so I was on a totally different wavelength) I just turned to him and said “NO.” He got the fuck out of there real quick.
THAT’S AMAZING.
That is AMAZING and I hope I remember it (instead of just getting rage mind-wiped) the next time that happens. I also really want to just shout it down the street or something.
I’ve had some success with, “Look, I have no problem with you personally, but I’m just not going to sleep with you.”
The thing is, I actually don’t think hitting on people is a bad thing at all. Just…have these guys met humans before? Or said words out loud?
Yes! I kind of like being hit on, when it used to happen, because it was flattering. But these guys… it’s like they’ve learned how to hit on a girl from watching monkey mating rituals.
Apparently not, because no reasonably intelligent, normally functioning human being would say, “Are those your eyes?”
YES THIS. My friends are always telling me to be “nicer” and “more open-minded” when dudes hit on me like this, because I either completely ignore them or flat out tell them to leave me alone. “You’re NEVER going to meet ANYONE if you shut every guy down who hits on you!!” I would rather never EVER meet (or have sex with) anyone ever again than have to deal with these dudes who approach women at random like “wow has anyone ever told you how beautiful you are?”. Fuck off bros, that’s what I say.
Oh man I just an hour ago got stuck in a gchat with a friend who was trying to convince me to change my FB profile pic. away from a selfie of me glowering with my Male Tears mug to something “cuter” because I was going to scare away the guys she was trying to set me up with. I tried to explain to her that a) I have that picture up on purpose and b) my profile is also locked down for a reason, but she just wasn’t having it. “You can’t LEAD with Male Tears!” Personally, I follow a “Love Me, Love My Misandry” attitude towards dating and if that means I take to the sea, alone, so be it. We don’t WANT to meet/date/be nice to the dingus at the bar or the dude creeping our profiles, so why should we try to sell ourselves to them?
Multiple thumbs up to this, if I could!
Amen! Whyyyyyy do our friends say stuff like that? WHO’S SIDE ARE YOU ON, FRIENDS?
‘I follow a “Love Me, Love My Misandry” attitude towards dating and if that means I take to the sea, alone, so be it.’ I want this printed out on cards to hand out to anyone who suggests I make myself more palatable to the douchebros of the world.
My fave was from a few years ago, when waiting for the bus to go to work, a grown-ass man, 35 to 40 at least, came up to me and started hitting on me, and followed up with, “What school you go to, baby?”
So, dude thinks I’m underage and that’s why he’s hitting on me?
Bus came very shortly thereafter, and made my escape. Never did think of an appropriate comeback.
D:
I’m pretty sure “Your mom” is always an appropriate comeback.
(Ok, fine, it’s buying into a madonna/whore binary that is entirely a tool of the patriarchy. But it also makes me laugh. You could switch it up with “Your dad” occasionally.)
EW EW EW
Oh sweet God in heaven.
“THE POLICE ACADEMY. LET ME SEE WHAT’S IN YOUR BAG, PERV.”
One time when I was in high school, I came home from school (parents were away) to find a cop sitting there. He tried to follow me inside and asked me whether I was in high school or college. It was near-traumatizing. I’m pretty sure this is why I am way more mistrustful of cops than your average middle-class white girl.
These are too great. The last one reminds me of one I once got, from a drunk-off-his-ass cowboy in a bar one Halloween: “You’re too pretty to be Chinese.”
(I am not Chinese. Nor am I particularly pretty. I had, however, just said something about China, and Racist Cowboy had recently come to the slow and hard-won realization that neither of my two extremely hot friends were interested in taking him home. His desperation to get laid was palpable; his brain, not large.)
I don’t even think I responded, just stared at him. And that, my children, is the story of the Last Time I Went Out On Halloween.
In CVS’s chocolate aisle, staring at All My Options.
Creepy man: “What are you going to buy?”
Me: “NOTHING.”
Creepy man: “Oh you must be married, otherwise you would want to talk to me.”
Me: [runs out of CVS chocolate-less and sad]
I HAVE ALSO BEEN HIT ON AT CVS (specifically while buying DayQuil and an industrial size bag of throat lozenges). Like, CVS? Really???
WHAT THE FUCK
HOW DARE HE RUIN THE SACRED CHOCOLATE AISLE!?
I normally have a very efficient force field (and I’ve now aged out of the prime hitting-on demographic), but years ago I got cornered by a BusinessTodd at a bar who tried perhaps the least-effective line ever, starting a sentence with “I’m not a racist, but…” I do not know what the rest of that thought was, because I said “No, I am not talking to you any longer” and turned my back on him. Minor, but satisfying.
Ahh what who LEADS with that??
To be fair, there was some innocuous chitchat before that, probably me saying I was a grad student and taught at Local University. So the rest of that terrible thought was probably something about minority-student achievement or something. Still.
Hahaha, I was picturing someone walking up to you in a bar and just being like, “SO, I’m not racist, BUT…”
Sexy!
It’s so nice when racists identify themselves early on in a conversation by saying “I’m not a racist but–“
I sometimes amuse myself by thinking of non-racist ways to finish that sentence. I have three.
Oh, brilliant, brilliant!
this is WONDERFUL!
“Your name is so e-x-o-t-i-c!!! Where are you from? No, where are you *really* from?”
The best time I responded to terrible flirting in an appropriate way:
<8th grade, hit on by a dude I hated while in class.>
Dude: Do I make you horny baby? (Obviously quoting Austin Powers, but I hadn’t seen it and didn’t know that)
Me: No! You disgust me!
Dude: Well… good… you disgust me too….
Oh, I have a chance to tell my favorite getting hit on story! I was at my favorite bar, it’s close to last call and the DJ liked to play Journey’s ‘Don’t Stop Believin’ at the end of the night. So I’m singing along with my friends and this creepy older guy tries to hit on me saying ‘Oh, you know the words to this song, you must be around my age.’ And I had the presence of mind (and lowered inhibitions) to snap back ‘No, I just listen to a lot of oldies music.’
*cues up ‘One Shining Moment’ music*
My best response to being hit on in a bar was standing up (I’m tall and was in heels to boot), looking down my nose at the guy and saying in my best James Earl Jones voice: “WHAT IS IT YOU WANT, LITTLE MAN?”
“you got a nice ass for a white girl” – man on 14th street
Oooh that makes me angry for so many reasons.
I’ve had that so many times. One time it happened while I was wearing a knee-length coat, unbuttoned, like how could they even SEE my ass??
So many strangers feel justified touching my hair because it’s curly, it is only a matter of time before I destroy one of them.
I’ve enjoyed the few times where I’ve been intensely flirting with a guy, and he goes to run his fingers through my curly hair, only for them to get caught somewhere in the middle and he has to untangle his hand while I just sit there and go “do you know how curly hair works?”
It’s boggling and terrible how many people think that’s ok. Were they absent when all the other four-year-olds were taught not to touch things that aren’t theirs?
One time a guy at a bar told me I had nice toes.
:-/
“Stolen Eyeballs” tag YESSSSSSS
Guidelines for public transportation: Mostly stick to yourself, stick your nose in a book. When eye contact is incidentally made with a person you find attractive, a polite smile–as opposed to a creepy grin–is allowed. If that same attractive person is walking the same route after exiting the bus/train, MAYBE you can say “I swear I’m not following you” or “You’re not following me are you?”. I guess that goes for people you’re not a attracted to as well. If you run into someone you know on the train/bus, talk quietly so as not to embarrass yourselves or bother others, let them get back to their book/headphones if they want.
I used to think I got hit on a lot, but it turns out that representatives from the Damn, Girl Foundation just conduct a lot of screenings for thick legs in my area.
The only time I was able to ever effectively shut a guy down was when he was walking behind me down the street and started shouting about how nice “my figure was”.
I turned around and said, “You know, it’s actually very rude to comment on other people’s bodies.”
He apologized! And called me ma’am. I can only hope that stuck with him?
I’ve got a list of getting-hit-on anecdotes and my responses arranged from best to worst:
1) Guy waiting to order at the bar: “Damn, baby, you got nice breasts!”
Me: “…Thank you.”
Him: “No, seriously, I don’t mean to be rude, but DAMN, GIRL.”
Me: (now laughing hysterically) “Thank you again.”
His girlfriend slowly swivels from her place at the bar, looks me up and down, and then turns back to her drink, unthreatened.
2) Guy on the street outside a bar: “Hey, baby, you want to come back to my crib and drink some MUSCAT?”
Me: “No, thank you, sir.”
He then told me that I was fancy and proceeded to tell me proudly all about his son, who he told me was named Cheeseburger and was looking for a nice girl like me.
3) Multiple people who I do not know come up to me and begin stroking my hair, murmuring softly in Italian. (This was in Italy. I do not speak Italian.) My response is to freeze like a rabbit and wait for it to stop, occasionally muttering, “What? No…”
All of those are great, but #2 is especially hilarious. What in the world? SO bizarre.
Once while at a farmer’s market in Irvine with friends, the older gentleman running the hummus stand offered to take us home and cook for us if any of us were willing to marry him. His hummus was pretty good…
Ok, someone tell me if this is A Thing. So, I’m a fat chick. I think I’m cute, but whatever: I don’t get hit on a lot. EXCEPT: I feel like there are certain dudes who hit on me, ask for my number, etc. because they sense that somehow I must be desperate or really easy because I’m not conventionally attractive. This tends to happen in the grocery store or other weird contexts. Maybe I’m just being paranoid and there’s some deep-seated issues here (“how could anyone legitimately be attracted to me?”), but I really think there’s a sense that they “have a shot” with me. Like, if a conventionally hot woman were also looking at tomatoes, they would never come up to her and ask, “hey baby, you single?” Right?
I think most women get hit on occasionally in that sort of weird context, regardless of conventional attractiveness. I don’t understand the sort of person who does that enough to tell you whether they are attracted to you or just automatically respond with weird pick up lines to the sight of a woman, but I doubt it’s because they think you are unattractive.
The kind of guy who will hit on you because he thinks other people won’t find you attractive is the kind of guy who will straight up tell you that’s what he’s doing.
Two guys walking behind me downtown and one is trying to talk to me by yelling rudely so I ignore him. But then his friend says “I don’t think she wants to talk to you man” and I said “your friend is right I don’t want to talk to you”. “I told you!” Thanks dude ditch your friend.
Another one: old guy walking past me and friends tells us to give him a kiss. Me “fuck off!”
“Aw I’m just trying to have some fun” you have a fucked up idea of fun sir.
This is the best pick-up line I have ever received, so funny I couldn’t even be mad. The guy who delivered it was clearly homeless, had a magnificent beard and disheveled teeth.
He did the long, slow once-over, from feet to face, and said admiringly:
“Girl, you look like you get a balanced diet.”
This was, oh, twelve years ago, and I will never forget that man.
Walking home from the gym, five months post-partum and feeling fat. T-shirt and ratty sweatpants. A voice rings out, “Damn white girl, you got a FAT ass!”
I probably should have been mad, but it totally made my day. Nice to feel appreciated!
Oh, lord. “I’d take money from the mob for you! What are you, Italian?” “I like the way you work your hot dog, baby. All that ketchup AND onions!” [That one took place when I was like fourteen] “You want some fries with that shake?” “Damn, she even WALKS like a sister!” (I have no problem with being compared to black women, but like…what even was that) “I want to fuck you.” “Ooooh, TITS!”
Never hit on a lady browsing the vibrators and general toy selection at Good Vibrations. Not the time, bro.
Ahh I am late to this but the one time I ever got called out to by a stranger and enjoyed it was in college.
Random dude on street: Girl, you should be a MODEL
Me: (smirking) Yeah, OK
RDOS: No, I’m serious! You should do it…damn…
Something about his demeanor and delivery made me feel like he had no interest in acting predatory but felt I should know that there was a possible revenue stream I might not be tapping into.
(…I did not become a model, instead I gained 45 pounds and now RELISH being way less visible to most men)
Ah, they aren't particularly strong, so bear with me. People say "they could be saying something not racist.", and I try to think how that could be so.
"I'm not racist, but I am faceblind. I only recognize you by your distinctive nasal voice."
"I'm not racist, but my brother is, and I try to avoid events where he will embarrass me."
"I'm not racist, but I was raised in a racist society, so occasionally I make terrible terrible judgment calls that I am very sorry about."
I’ve had a couple of gross things said my way, but there’s one time where I actually felt ok – I was in Ocean City Maryland working for a summer, and on one of my off days, I was out and about wearing my favourite hibiscus green circle skirt (RIP) when an older man walking by stopped, looked at me and said, in a kindly way
‘you’re looking especially beautiful today.’
I smiled, and he walked off. That was that. I still think he was genuinely paying a compliment, and maybe would have said it to anyone of any gender, if he felt that they were looking their best that day and needed someone to tell them.
My favorite getting-hit-on strategy comes from my best friend, the most beautiful and misandrist human I’ve ever met:
Men approach her on the reg on her walk to the train/store/wherever. She turns stiffly, makes eye contact, and growls, “Kill yourself.”
I’m not quite sure how to handle the semi-regular “I like yo figure girl” comments I get standing at the bus stop.
“Thanks! I stole it from a dead woman.”
I go for ‘all out creepy’ in these situations. The trick is to think of awful things and say them in a perky tone.
Hahahaha. This is great.
One time a vendor at a bead show where I worked offered my boss 30 camels for me. He went by Romeo though, so I didn’t fully trust his offer.
"Thanks! I stole it from a dead woman."
I go for 'all out creepy' in these situations. The trick is to think of awful things and say them in a perky tone.
I'm a big fan of, "Why the fuck should I?"